[wk_end]

I disagree completely with the idea that people only still think of Fender-style guitars as good because of boutique builders. Not that I disagree with the premise that boutique builders are making better guitars for better prices. But rich engineers and lawyers play boutique guitars - almost everyone else, including most professional musicians, still play Fenders (or one of the other big mainstream brands).

Fender and even Squier workmanship is fine. Their fundamental designs are both good and iconic. In truth, most guitars on the market these days are pretty good and people mostly just choose the one that makes them feel cool and part of a musical community and lineage. So people would continue to gravitate towards Fender-style guitars for literal generations, as long as guitarists revere the legion of Fender players before them.

I say “would” because the damage here is IMO reputational. It doesn’t matter how much guitarists revere Hendrix, Gilmour, Clapton, and a zillion other legendary Strat players if enough word gets around that Fender guitars are made by assholes. They’ll stop making people feel cool. Corporate lawfare is extremely not rock ‘n’ roll.

[hmmokidk]

I don’t think this is true. I think it’s a beginner musician attitude (due to branding) but musicians often grow out of it.

I would never get a fender for quality / value reasons. Some of them look cool; which may be why they want to sue.

But the quality of the instrument and the sound is too important to me personally.

To me 3K is the most i’ve paid for an instrument, and I gig with two <600$ guitars.

[nickserv]

I think you're both right.

Marketing is very effective, and lots of people are willing to pay a little bit more for a particular brand.

On the other hand there's also lots of people who will look for the best value for the money, or want to support smaller luthiers.

As you mentioned usually with experience one gravitates towards the second group, but most instrument purchases is entry level gear for beginners.

Disclaimer: coming from classical guitar world, but have noticed largely the same pattern, eg someone paying more for an Alhambra when a regional luthier will be less. Not that Alhambra is a bad brand, just that those marketing salaries have to come from somewhere!

[Tanoc]

As far as I know it's mostly rich hobbyists or people purchasing for decoration that buy Fenders just because of name recognition. Almost everyone else gets guitars from small custom shops because they're cheaper, better built, and you're not stuck with a single bridge style and two choices of pickups. That's if they don't just buy off the rack stuff from ESP or Ibanez, who have absolutely devoured Fender's market share in the under $2,000 category. Which incidentally is the largest consumer base. The only thing Fender sells consistently is the Telecaster and the Jaguar, both of which people prefer off the shelf versions of rather than getting from the custom shop because you can't really mess with the design of either without drastically altering the sound.

If you want an example of when this kind of lawsuit backfires and causes reputational loss like you say, look at Gibson. A few years ago they sued Music Man, First Act, Jackson, Dean, and a few others over the "flying V" design that came out in 1958 and had already been genericized by the early '80s. They won on trademark grounds against Dean and the resulting fear over the other open lawsuits caused a few Flying V and Explorer lookalikes to go out of production. Since then anyone who remembers the ordeal has warned people away from ever purchasing their guitars. Gibson were in terrible but improving condition in 2024 having just left bankruptcy in 2019 and the fallout from the lawsuit being revived last year has massively hurt their sales and left them right on the track to death again.

[spamizbad]

> But rich engineers and lawyers play boutique guitars - almost everyone else, including most professional musicians, still play Fenders (or one of the other big mainstream brands).

I'm familiar with this stereotype but two things:

1) Based on the data I've seen, a higher percentage of a boutique brand's guitars are purchased by working musicians than the mainstream brands. They're such a small segment of the market however those musicians seem rare by comparison.

2) Hobbyists, across all income levels, are responsible for the vast majority of gear sold. The working musician is really just collecting the "discount" from economies of scale afforded by this phenomena.

[butlike]

Is it an asshole move to protect a trademark? The bottom line is that the pop and pop and boutique shops are riding on the coattails of Fender's design. Why don't they come up with a new, iconic design instead?

[4d4m]

I agree with you due to cnc and production being relatively standardized